Toby Fox owns Undertale and all associated characters.

Frisk watched Chara pacing back and forth on the sidewalk, grateful that his sister was wearing shoes, so the only sound from her footsteps was a dull thumping noise, rather than the clanking of metal on concrete.

"They're late," she said, for what felt like the hundredth time, stopping her pacing and crossing her black metal arms to stare down the street.

"Come on, Chara. We're in Paris! People are allowed to stop and smell the roses, you know."

"Your brother is right, dear," Toriel supplied from where she and Sans sat at the steps up to the large, intricately designed hotel where they would be staying for the next few days. "It's not like we didn't stop to see the sights a few times on the way here, we cannot begrudge them for doing the same."

"Don't get your circuits in a twist," Sans supplied. "I'm sure they'll be here soon, wire just going to have to wait a little longer."

Chara just huffed in annoyance, and Frisk rolled his eyes as she resumed her pacing. He took a moment to look around, enjoying the sights set before him.

The city really was beautiful. The part they were in had cobblestone streets and gorgeous buildings made in a style no longer used in the modern day, but still as pristine and well-kept as when they had first been built. A flock of birds nestled in a nearby tower, and if Frisk strained his ears, he could almost hear their song.

"Much as I love them, you know that Dad, Kid and Papyrus are all easily distracted," Chara continued. "That's it. if they're not here in five minutes, I'm calling them."

"Whatever you say, Chara," Frisk murmured, not really paying attention. Instead, he watched the different cars going down the streets, keeping his eyes peeled for any models that he didn't usually see back home.

"Howdy!" Frisk turned and was relieved to see Asgore and Papyrus walking towards them from around a corner, both wearing huge smiles. Asgore was wearing his "Mr. Dad Guy" shirt and camo shorts, while Papyrus, of course, was in his "Cool Dude" outfit.

"Sorry we're late." The large Boss Monster chuckled as he closed in on them. "It sure is easy to get turned around here, but at least there's always something to see on the way."

"Finally," Chara muttered while Sans and Toriel stood to greet the arrivals.

"No kidding," Frisk grinned. "You made it just in time, Chara's pacing was driving me insane."

"Yeah, yeah. Big baby," Chara muttered, stepping to the side as Toriel embraced Asgore, nuzzling him in a tooth-rotting display of affection. She frowned and took a look around, her brows knitting.

"Where's Kid?"

Papyrus looked surprised.

"We thought he was with you! He bought something a little while ago, and ran ahead with it. Didn't he get here yet?"

"You let him go ahead by himself?!" Chara yelled, her eyes shining brightly. "He's never been in this city before, he probably got lost on the way!"

"Asgore…" Toriel chided, a stern look on her face. The former king winced.

"We knew we weren't very far from here…" he mumbled sheepishly. "And he seemed very focused on getting to you… we thought-"

"Idiots," Chara muttered, her eyes closing, probably to allow her to dial Kid's visor.

"Chara! You will not speak that way about your father," Toriel warned.

"Don't worry, bucko," Sans said walking forward. "I'm sure he's fine, he'll just need-"

Chara's eyes snapped open.

"He's not answering."

"What do you mean?" Frisk asked. "The thing's stuck to the side of his head, there's no way he can miss it!"

"It says that the number's not in service." Chara looked down the street. "Something's wrong. I have to find him!"

"Chara!" Toriel called. But the robotic girl was already running down the street, and disappearing around a corner.

"Don't worry, she can take care of herself, Tori," Sans said quietly. "She might have the right idea though. We should find her boyfriend before he gets himself into trouble."

"Well, we all have our cell phones, correct?" Papyrus piped up. "We can split up and keep in contact with each other while we look for him! With all of us working together, we'll find him in no time!"

"Good thinking, Papyrus!" Frisk said, genuinely impressed.

"Frisk, you should go with Papyrus," Toriel stated. "I will go with Asgore. Call if you find anything, alright?"

At her tone, Asgore's ears drooped, knowing that his wife was going to give him a talking-to for this. But he still managed a smile.

"Sounds good," Sans replied, turning and walking away. "See ya soon."

Chara raced down the sidewalks, evading anyone she came across. She focused her magic, trying to feel any traces of Kids magical signature. She cursed herself for not having worked more at detecting magic. Her skills in that field were rudimentary at best. She vowed to herself that she'd work on that when they got back home, as she skidded around a corner and bolted forwards.

There weren't very many Monsters in Paris. There had been a lot of spreading out from Mt. Ebott since the Underground opened up, but this was practically halfway around the world. Fortunately, that narrowed down her search quite a bit; any magical presence she did manage to feel would have a good chance of being Kid.

She turned off the main street, and dove into a maze of alleyways, calling Kid's name a couple of times as she did so. The alleyways here were nowhere near as nice as the main streets, the scent of stale garbage was prevalent in the air, and a few beggars in dirty clothes looked up to watch her as she streaked past.

There! She felt it, a vague tingling sensation at the edge of her senses. A faint magical energy. She increased her speed, unsure if it was Kid or not, but if it was, then she needed to get to him before he got into trouble.

He'd better be okay. She thought to herself, eyes narrowing and trying not to think of the situations her boyfriend could have gotten himself into. All that took a back seat in her mind however, as she entered another alleyway and finally saw Kid.

He was lying on his back on the ground, only his shoulders and neck pressed up against the brick wall as he looked up, fear shining in his brown eyes. His shirt was torn to reveal cuts on his torso, and his visor was discarded a few feet away. It looked like it had been stomped on repeatedly.

He was surrounded by six men wearing old leather jackets and smelling faintly of alcohol, with a seventh crouching over him, holding a dagger just above the boy's eye.

Chara let out a scream of feral rage, her eye blazing forth in an inferno of power, causing the group to whip their attention to her. Even as a knife formed in one hand, her other gestured, calling the various colored souls forth from the men's bodies. They were clearly unused to the sensation and they stumbled, shouting in alarm.

She swung the knife, a beam of energy exploding from it and neatly slicing through three of the souls, each one shattering in its wake. As the men let out gasps and collapsed lifelessly to the ground, three orbs of her energy formed behind her and fired, each smashing into another soul and killing them instantly.

Only the man who had been moments away from stabbing Kid was left. He had stumbled away from the boy when his soul had been called forth, though he still held the dagger loosely in his grip as he stared wide-eyed at the vengeful robot before him.

Chara leapt forwards, knocking the man down and holding her knife right over his heart, much in the same way he had just been with Kid.

"Please!" He gasped. No accent. He was either very well educated, or not from around here. "Mercy!"

"Mercy?" She growled, her synthetic voice amplified by the dual-tones that always awakened when her power manifested. "He asked for mercy, didn't he? I saw your souls, he never even attacked you did he? But you didn't care."

The man whimpered as he stared up into the face of death.

"I will give you the same mercy you showed him!"

With that, she plunged the knife down, watching the dark brown heart beneath it shatter and the man below her go limp.

She stood, panting slightly and allowing her knife to fade from her hand and her eye to go out. Then she gasped. Kid.

She turned back to him and ran to his prone body. His eyes had closed and his breathing was ragged.

"Kid? Kid can you hear me?" Chara desperately pulled the boy up into a sitting position, pressing his back against the wall. "Say something!"

The boy coughed, and Chara could swear she saw flecks of dust shimmering from the exhalation. He cracked open his eyes.

"Cha...ra?" He managed. "S..sorry I'm… late…."

Chara focussed on his soul and barely stifled a cry. The tiniest sliver of his energy was left… and it was flickering in a way she'd never seen before.

"Don't worry about that, just hold on, okay?" She said, her voice frantic. "I'm calling Mom right now, she'll come and help you, just don't die on me!"

Kid let out another cough, then his eyes fluttered closed. He slumped down, and Chara barely caught him before he hit the ground. She froze, staring at him in wide-eyed terror.

No…

It took a couple moments before she realized that he hadn't turned to dust yet. She'd never seen a Monster do something like this before, but if he wasn't dust, then…

She propped him back up against the wall gently, then dialed her mother.

"Hello?" Toriel asked.

"Mom, I'm sending you the GPS for where I am." Chara said hurriedly. "You need to come here right now."

"Did you find him?" Toriel asked.

"Yeah, but he's really badly hurt." She looked down at the boy. "I think… I think he's Fallen Down."

There was a gasp from the other end.

"What happened?"

"Not now, Mom! He needs help! Come over here as quickly as you can, okay?"

She hung up before her mother had a chance to reply. The sooner she got here, the better, and she didn't have time for her mother's questions. Not now, not with the looming threat that the one she loved could be snatched away from her… for the second time.

Already, the waiting was killing her. It already felt like hours since she had called her mother, and she had to resist the urge to call her again. She tried looking down at Kid, but the wounds sported on his body caused her to look away, especially since she could see dust on the edges of the cuts. If he died…

She cast her gaze about, afraid to look at the boy and afraid to touch him, lest he crumble to dust in her hands like in her dreams. Her eyes once again focused on his visor, broken and battered, the holographic interface long since sizzled out.

Close by however, there was another discarded object that she hadn't noticed before. She rose and made her way towards it, reaching out an arm to grab the small plastic bag and held it open, peering at the contents inside.

Chocolate. Not only that, but he had somehow found Monster chocolate, in this city where barely any lived. The pieces fell together in her mind. He had bought this for her… and had ran ahead of the others to bring it to her.

She clutched the bag to her chest. She wanted to wail, wanted to cry out in rage, but even though she opened her mouth, nothing came out.

She walked unsteadily back to her boyfriend, falling to her knees beside him, still holding the small bag close to her.

That was how Toriel found them, appearing at the mouth of the alleyway with Asgore close behind. She let out a small gasp as Chara raised her head, tears running down her face.

"What happened here?" she asked, rushing forward to the two, kneeling as soon as she reached the boy and letting healing magic flow out to encompass him. Asgore followed, albeit slower and looked carefully around the alleyway, his gaze pausing as it fell on the scattered Human corpses.

"Can you heal him?" Chara asked, her voice pleading.

Toriel didn't miss that she was avoiding the question, but she focused her efforts on the boy. After a few minutes, she lowered her hands, her eyes sorrowful.

"Chara…"

The girl knew what she was going to say, but stubbornly held onto her denial.

"No. No, you have to be able to help him! He can't… You can't let him…"

"Chara, no-one has ever recovered from Falling Down before."Toriel said quietly, pain and grief evident in her features as she looked at her trembling daughter. "It's only a matter of time before-"

"No!" Chara shouted, getting to her feet, magic leaking from her right eye. "There has to be a way! We can't just let him die like this!"

"Chara…" Asgore tried.

"What about Alphys? She knows more about souls than anyone! She has to be able to help!"

"This is different," Asgore said gently, though tears glistened at the corners of his eyes. "The only time she brought people back from that was by accident, and they became the Amalgamates."

"I have to try," Chara replied through gritted teeth. "I'll take him there myself if I have to!"

Before her parents could argue her, there was a soft whooshing sound and suddenly Sans was there. He scanned the alleyway in a moment, the white dots in the middle of his sockets shrinking at the sight of the dead Humans.

"Looks like I was late to the party. What's going on here?"

"Kid was attacked," Chara explained tersely, while gently picking up Kid and cradling him carefully in her arms. "I'm taking him back to Alphys."

Sans's gaze flicked to her parents for a moment, then to the unconscious reptile before he looked back at her.

"You know there isn't going to be another plane going back home for a couple days, and even if there was, it wouldn't get there in time."

"What do you care? You never do anything unless everything's in danger! You're useless!"

"Chara!" Toriel gasped. Sans took a step towards the girl and lowered his voice so the others couldn't hear.

"You're angry and upset, so I'm just going to ignore that for now." A harsh blue light began shining from his left eye. "But I have fought harder than anyone for this. Don't you dare tell me I don't care."

Chara flinched at that, taking a wary step away from the skeleton. He looked at her another moment before the light faded and he reached out his arms.

"Here, give him to me. I can get him back to Alphys real quick. I know a shortcut."

"But Mt. Ebott is on the other side of the world!" Asgore exclaimed incredulously. "Your shortcuts extend that far?"

The skeleton shrugged, not taking his sockets off the hesitant Chara.

"I'll be out of commission for about a week afterwards but… yeah."

Chara still hesitated for a moment, aware of the gazes of the other three Monsters on her. She looked down at Kid, the light from her red eyes dully reflecting off his scales.

"Alright, but I'm coming with you," she said, stepping towards the skeleton. Sans shook his head.

"Buddy, I've barely got the energy to make this trip, let alone with one extra person. I don't think I can handle a second one. So if you want Kid to get to Alphys and not, say… the middle of the ocean, I suggest you let me take care of this one."

"Listen to him, Chara," Toriel pleaded as the mechanical girl glared at the skeleton. "I understand your anger, but now is not the time for it."

The girl closed her eyes and took a deep breath before stepping towards Sans, gently maneuvering Kid so that he sat at the skeleton's feet.

"Fine. Take him to Alphys. But I'm coming after you."

"And how are you going to manage that, kiddo?"

In response, Chara rolled her shoulders and two thin, curved metal rods extended from her back, just below her neck. They curved up and out, extending about three feet in either direction. Once they stopped extending, each one glowed brightly for a couple seconds before a sheet of energy extended from them, nearly touching the ground.

She flapped her new wings experimentally.

"Like this."

Her parents stared blankly at her, but Sans seemed unsurprised.

"Alright. See you there, then."

"Sans!" Toriel exclaimed. "Can I have a word with you for a minute?"

"Is now really the time, Mom?" Chara asked angrily, even as Sans walked towards her. When Toriel didn't answer, the mechanical girl let out a frustrated noise and crossed her arms, alternating between watching the two and looking back down at Kid.

"Sup, Tori?" Sans asked once the woman had pulled him to the side. Asgore had stayed behind, and was attempting to soothe Chara.

"Why did you tell her that she could follow you?" Toriel whispered angrily. "I do not know when she got those wings, but she cannot fly across an entire ocean with them!"

"I think you'd be surprised." Sans sighed. "Look, right now, it's the best option. She can't be a part of the meeting anymore, not if we want continued peace between Humans and Monsters."

Toriel glanced to the scattered bodies.

"Do you think she did this?"

"More than think, I know. She's angry and upset right now, and it's better for her to use that energy flying across the ocean than have to stay here and find some… other way of letting that out."

"She doesn't have to come to the meeting," Toriel argued. "She can stay in the hotel, but-"

"If she does that, best-case scenario; she ends up flying out here anyways. Worst-case… You know she's never been the biggest fan of Humans, and this incident hasn't helped that opinion any. Trust me, Tori, it's for the best."

The Boss Monster looked at him for a moment, before deflating slightly.

"Very well. She can go. But Sans…" She gave him a hard look. "When this meeting is over, and we come back, you and I are going to have a talk. And you are going to tell me everything." She leaned in a little closer. "Do I make myself clear? No more secrets."

Sweat began beading on the skeleton's skull. He looked into Toriel's eyes, and saw no means of escape. He sighed.

"Alright, Tori."

Sans walked back to the boy, ignoring the angry "Finally!" from Chara. He laid both his hands on the boy, and in a moment, they were gone.

"Be careful, alright Chara?" Toriel called to Chara as she took off. But she didn't respond, instead flapping her wings as hard as she could to build up speed while avoiding the buildings in the way. She rarely used the wings, because they were such a big drain on her battery, but she'd use every drop of her magic to fuel herself across the ocean if she had to.

She still held the bag close to her chest.

Author's note: Your move, Vitaking.